


Second Degree Sunburns

by MicrosuedeMouse



Category: Camp Camp (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, bonding over X Files
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2017-07-16
Packaged: 2018-12-03 03:06:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11523234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MicrosuedeMouse/pseuds/MicrosuedeMouse
Summary: Gwen doesn't remember 'David's nurse' being in her job description, but if someone doesn't look out for him the whole damn camp will fall apart. Max can take his crude insinuations and get lost. She's just trying to keep her job.





	Second Degree Sunburns

**Author's Note:**

> I'VE BEEN WORKING ON THIS ONE FOR A WHILE... I really didn't know where it was going when I started; it was just a premise at that point, and it came from realizing that David probably burns like crazy. I'm sure I'm not the first person to think of it.
> 
> Before you ask, yes, second degree sunburns are a thing, and I've known people who got 'em. It's not nice.
> 
> For the record also I was about halfway through this on Tuesday when I got super fried myself at Port Dover. Our sunscreen was expired? Anyway I didn't get as bad as David here but I'm still noticeably red and peeling. So. Remember your sunscreen, kids
> 
> (If you enjoy this, a comment would be super appreciated! They keep me going. I have more fun CC/Gwenvid ideas on the way, so lemme know if you want 'em!)

“Really, Gwen, I promise! I’m absolutely dandy!” David tried to take a confident stance, fists on his hips, but his point was undermined when he winced at the contact.

“You are _not dandy_ ,” Gwen told him, growling in exasperation. “Honest to God, David, you’re a fucking _lobster._ How did this happen?”

“Well,” he admitted, “after all the kids were sunscreened, there was none left for me. I added it to Quartermaster’s shopping list, but in the meantime, there was still a whole day of swimming camp to run!”

“Yeah, I know there was, but…” It wasn’t like she hadn’t been there. She’d spent most of her Monday trying to stop Nikki from diving down deep in search of the bottom of the lake, not to mention the half hour it took her to prevent Max from successfully hitching an escape ride on one of the passing ships from Pirate Camp. But she hadn’t realized that David didn’t have a single drop of sunscreen, or she would have done something to avoid the current situation. What business did white people have going out in the sun if this was what happened after a single day? “Couldn’t you have put on a damn shirt or something?”

“Gwen, we have to teach the kids that their bodies are nothing to be ashamed of,” David told her earnestly.

“Oh my god,” she answered, unable to stop herself. She squeezed her eyes shut and pinched the bridge of her nose for a moment, taking a few deep breaths and trying to calm down a little. Then she took a couple steps closer to him and leaned in to look more closely, shifting to inspect his back next. “David, these are horrible,” she said. “Like, the ones on your shoulders might actually qualify as second degree. You’ve got some nasty blistering going on.”

“That’s fine,” David said as she straightened up in front of him. “Nothing I can’t handle.” Now that she was close to his face, she could see that his eyes were a little wet, his grin a little strained. Frankly, she couldn’t blame him. She knew by now that her coworker had a surprisingly high pain tolerance, but anyone would be justified in shedding a couple tears over this kind of damage. His entire body had been cooked.

“How does this _happen_ to you?” she asked. “I didn’t think a real human could get this toasted in the sun alone.”

“Redhead,” he pointed out, gesturing to his hair. She could see the effort it took not to cringe every time he moved. “Lots of Irish heritage.”

“Your entire fucking skin has been fried so hard it’s shrinking around your body as I speak,” Gwen observed, possibly still just trying to get her head around the concept. “I mean, I’ve been sunburnt before. But not like this. Won’t you die the next time you try to touch something?”

“It’s not my _entire_ skin,” he argued, still stubbornly clinging to that infuriating sense of optimism. “Everything that was inside my shorts is fine, and the soles of my feet are a-okay! And my scalp is only _mildly_ burnt.”

“Oh my god!” she said again, both distressed and disgusted to know that this was something that could happen to a human body. “Seriously, David? Go sit down, I’m getting the aloe.”

“Oh, that’s fine, Gwen—” he started to say, but she glared at him.

“Sit,” she repeated menacingly, and he did as he was told, perching very carefully on the edge of his desk.

Gwen fetched a giant bottle of aloe vera gel, most of it already used, off of the bare wooden shelves in their little washroom, returning to the office that was their cabin’s front room and squirting a huge dollop onto her hands. “I don’t remember ‘David’s nurse’ being in the job description when I applied here,” she grumbled as she started smearing it across his back.

“You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to!” David told her. “I can handle it myself.”

“No you can’t,” she snapped. “I’ve worked with you for long enough to know that your stupid gangly arms somehow can’t reach most of your back.” Worried that that might make it sound a little too much like she cared, she added, “Plus, I won’t get any sleep at all if you spend all night blubbering because it hurts to lay down, you fucking crybaby.”

There was a pause. “Well, thank you,” he answered.

“Ugh.” She squeezed another dollop onto her hands and then handed him the bottle. “Here, you can do your legs. By the way, you totally owe me one for touching your gross goddamn shoulders right now.”

“Okay,” he agreed, more readily than she’d expected. Then he was quiet, and she was left to massage aloe into the wiry muscles of his back in silence.

She didn’t mind this part, really. She was used to dealing with David’s injuries, only rarely inflicted by her these days. She was used to his body and used to rubbing things into it that would, hopefully, make him heal faster. She kind of wished she wasn’t used to it – her coworker was a hapless moron. This shouldn’t have been _necessary_. That said, the normalcy of it had created a kind of casual intimacy between them that made it easier to share that tiny cabin all summer long. And he did try to be as cooperative a patient as he could, which was more than she could say of any of the campers they’d ever had.

They passed the bottle back and forth, David coating his legs and chest, Gwen moving from his back and shoulders to his arms and eventually to his face. The bottle was nearly depleted by the time she wiped the gel over the tops of his ears and then, at his request, even into the part of his hair, where he could feel the burn on his scalp. “Have QM add this to the shopping list, too,” she told him, waving the almost-empty bottle. “There’s more in the supply closet in the mess hall, I think, but you’re going to be going through a lot of it in the next little while, and it’s not something we want to run out of.”

“Thanks again, Gwen,” David said. He was a little quieter now, having let go of some of his need to stay obnoxiously cheery even in the face of immense pain. “That does feel a lot better.”

“Yeah, well.” She glanced away for a second, rubbing her sticky hands on her arms. “Stop doing stupid shit that gets you hurt, okay? That would really help a lot _more_.”

He only smiled warmly. Baffled, she frowned at him. “What?” she asked.

“Nothing,” he said with a shrug. Then, “I’ll try.”

“Good. You better.”

 

The next morning, Gwen allowed herself to be dragged from her bed a full fifteen minutes earlier than usual to help David spread aloe on his burns again. Originally he’d tried to do it himself, dashing over to the mess hall in his pyjama pants for another bottle. But the sound of him grunting in pain as he tried to reach the awkward parts of his back roused her, and she drowsily got up to help. Normally she would have bitched at him about it, but it didn’t seem worth it.

“I think you cured overnight,” she grumbled at him, staring at the blistering skin of his upper back as she slathered him with green gel. “You look even redder, somehow. It’s like your whole body is aspiring to become indistinguishable from your hair.”

David laughed, clearly trying to mask his discomfort. “It’ll clear up soon,” he promised her unconvincingly.

“No it won’t,” she told him, not in the mood to submit to his optimism. “All of your skin is going to peel off and you’ll emerge pink and fresh as a fucking baby. I always knew you weren’t quite human. You’ve given yourself away, dipshit.”

He snorted again, visibly trying not to move too much. “I’ll escape back to the mothership before you can prove it to anyone, Mulder.”

Gwen paused. She was tired, maybe too tired to process all of the information she’d just received. For one, he was playing along with her stupid (and very sleepy) joke, which he rarely did. For another… “Okay, so you’ve watched The X Files, and we’re going to have a conversation about that later, when I’m lucid,” she told him firmly.

“Okay,” he answered with a grin.

She finished rubbing him down and he thanked her profusely again before she crossed back to her own bed, pulling the curtain that separated their sides of the room. She hadn’t been impressed with that the first time she saw the cabin, but she’d adjusted eventually. David was, at least, usually polite enough to stay in the front room when he worked on late-night projects. She still resented Campbell for being too cheap to give the counselors separate rooms, but she’d had worse roommates.

She was just finished getting dressed and working on putting her hair back when David said quietly, “Um, Gwen?”

“What’s up?” she asked, only half-listening.

“I can’t… I mean. It’s just that. Putting on a shirt is proving… difficult.”

That got her attention. She looked up at the curtain, pulling her ponytail tight. “Can I come through?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

She pushed the curtain back and put her hands on her hips as she assessed the situation. Three identical camp shirts lay crumpled on the bed next to him, and he was staring at them as if he thought that one of them might somehow work better than the others if only he could persuade it. He looked up at her sheepishly.

“I can’t even really lift my arms high enough to put one on,” he confessed, awkwardly. “And the fabric hurts against my skin…”

“These shirts are cheap as shit,” Gwen agreed quickly. “Not exactly silky soft.” They were coarse and a little itchy on the best of days, and she hadn’t crisped her entire body. She sighed and glanced over at the open drawer of his tiny dresser, which contained – as far as she could tell – _more_ identical green camp shirts, and nothing else. “You don’t have anything softer or lighter?” she asked, raising an eyebrow at him.

His sheepish smile only grew, eyebrows more worried by the moment. “No,” he said with a shake of his head. “I have the jacket I wear when it’s cold or wet, but that’s about it.”

She sighed. “I’d offer you something of mine, but there’s no way it’d fit you. We’re two completely different shapes.”

“Maybe Quartermaster would have something?” David suggested, his voice a little too hopeful.

She grimaced. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen him in any other clothes. Would you really _want_ to wear something of QM’s?”

“Well I can’t go shirtless!” he cried in distress.

She paused. “Well, why the hell not?” she asked after a moment. “You did yesterday, so it’s not like you’re going to _shock_ the kids. Besides, dudes go shirtless in summer all the time. Hell, we’ve seen most of our male campers shirtless a handful of times.”

“I don’t know, Gwen…” he answered uncertainly. “It just doesn’t feel right.”

“It’s not, like, inappropriate or whatever. You’re the one who told me that we have to ‘teach the kids that their bodies are nothing to be ashamed of,’” she told him, with air quotes and an eyeroll. “David, the alternative is going to have you in fucking _tears_ all day, it’ll be so uncomfortable. Obviously you can’t do fuck all in this state either way, but you might as well not be _dying_.” She crossed her arms. “You can take the umbrella out of the campmobile to keep the sun off you. It’ll be fine.”

David looked at the shirts on the mattress behind him again, a dismayed little whimper on his lips. Then he sighed and said, “Yeah… okay. Maybe you’re right.” His shoulders drooped.

Narrowing her eyes, she said, “David, just putting on a shirt won’t magically transform you into someone who can get through the day like normal. You’re a human tomato after a day on the barbecue. You’ve got to take a bit of a step back either way and let your skin heal.”

“Okay, okay,” he agreed, nodding. “Fine. You got me. I’m sorry.” He straightened up and tossed her an apologetic smile. “You read me too well.” He reached for the bandana on his dresser, stared at it for a moment, and then tucked it into the back pocket of his shorts.

“You’re predictable,” Gwen answered levelly, glancing away. A smile like that was more than she could handle at this hour. “Come on. Let’s go get the day started. You know how the kids riot when breakfast isn’t ready on time.”

With David’s mobility limited, Gwen and the Quartermaster forced him to sit down while they made breakfast. She scrambled a massive pan of eggs while QM buttered an unending supply of toast, and she tried not to think about the sanitary risks of him using his hook to do it. Anxious, David popped his head into the kitchen repeatedly to check in, and eventually Gwen pushed a stack of plastic cups towards him, instructing him to pour the orange juice if he _really_ had to help. He grinned widely and did his best to conceal the discomfort it caused him every time he moved his arms.

Gwen ordered David to sit down again while she distributed breakfast to the arriving campers and QM started washing their cooking dishes. By the time she reached the table she usually shared with David, he was gone again. Rolling her eyes, she sat down and started to eat, leaving David’s breakfast at his empty spot. If it was cold by the time he got back from whatever he was doing, that was his own damn fault.

He was back only a few moments later, though, stirring a steaming mug of coffee. He put it down next to her tray as he took his seat. “You look like you could use it,” he told her.

“Mm,” she answered tiredly, picking up the mug and taking a sip. She appreciated that David had long ago memorized how she took it. Then, registering the taste, she raised her eyebrows and glanced at him. “This isn’t the instant,” she observed slowly.

David smiled a little. “No. It’s the good stuff out of Quartermaster’s secret stash. Don’t tell him.” He tapped his reddened nose conspiratorially. “Thought you deserved a treat. You’ve been so helpful.”

Gwen rolled her eyes yet again, looking away in embarrassment. “Not like I have much choice,” she muttered. “If someone doesn’t take care of your sorry ass, things only get _worse_.” Nonetheless, she was a little impressed he’d stolen from QM. That was undeniably risky – and he’d done it just for her, without even taking anything for himself. She couldn’t decide whether the act was sweeter than it was stupid.

“Don’t think I didn’t notice your silence this morning,” he replied, looking a little amused. He scooped up a forkful of egg. “Normally you yell at me when I wake you up.”

Gwen only grunted in response, stuffing her mouth with toast to give herself a moment longer to come up with a suitably snide answer. Luckily, she was saved the trouble when Max stumbled into the mess hall late, bags under his eyes and clutching a coffee of his own. He slowed as he walked past the counselors.

“Holy shit, David, what the fuck happened to you?” Max asked, eyebrows raised. “You look like you spent the night in the oven!”

“This is what happens to you when you don’t wear sunscreen, Max,” David said, his ‘teaching-a-lesson’ voice already in place. Gwen had no idea how he could do that so early in the morning.

Max broke into a grin. “No, it’s what happens to _you_ when _you_ don’t wear sunscreen,” he laughed, jabbing a finger at David’s face and then pointing back at his own rich brown complexion.

Gwen barely prevented herself from snorting into her coffee. “Don’t be an asshole, Max, David’s really hurt,” she admonished, trying hard to keep her laughter out of her tone. “He’s in such bad shape he can’t even wear a shirt. Besides, you know you and I can get burnt too. Just not… like this.” She met the camper’s eye, and knew he could tell that she was amused. His triumphant little grin was infuriating.

“Sure. Whatever you say,” Max shrugged and carried on past them to join Neil and Nikki, who were saving his breakfast.

There was a moment of quiet before Gwen glanced at David again and caught him smiling into his drink, as if pleased with something. “Okay, what the hell do you keep grinning about?” she complained.

“Nothing,” he told her again, not meeting her eye. She glowered at him for a moment, but he didn’t react or even look up, so she sighed and went back to eating.

 

In an attempt to save David from too much activity – because Gwen knew that no matter _how_ much she tried to manage things herself, he was going to jump in all the time anyway – Gwen figured she’d pick an activity for the day that, ideally, wouldn’t require an awful lot of motion. Of course, nothing ever really went as planned, but she guessed she could _try_ to minimize disaster. She took a few minutes over breakfast to skim over David’s list: woodcarving? No _way_ she was handing most of these kids knives. Songwriting? Maybe, but knowing David he wouldn’t be able to resist the urge to pull out his guitar, and that wouldn’t be good for him right now. Dowsing? Why did they have _that?_

“Zen garden camp?” she asked, raising an eyebrow at David.

“Yeah!” he said excitedly. “The year before you joined us-”

“Whatever,” she responded, cutting him off quickly. “I don’t need the backstory. That sounds easy, right? We can manage that for today.”

“I think so!” David agreed. “Just double-check with Quartermaster. He’ll have to bring in the sand by truck.”

She raked a hand through her bangs, already second-guessing. But she didn’t have any better ideas. “Okay. Yeah. Sounds great.”

“Super!” he exclaimed, bouncing in his seat. “I can go get the rakes!”

She looked at him sideways for a moment, then sighed. He’d burst if he didn’t get to do anything, so he might as well take the easier jobs. God, why did he have to be so damn _eager?_ “Okay. Don’t scrape yourself on anything in the supply shed, it’ll hurt like a bitch. And go by the office first to grab the keys and get that umbrella out of the car, okay?”

“Yes Ma’am!” He gave her a salute and leapt out of his seat. She took the empty breakfast tray out of his hand and stacked in on top of her own, nodding towards the door.

“You go get that stuff. QM and I will handle the dishes.”

 

Gwen marched the kids out of the mess hall and out to the activities field just in time for them to watch the Quartermaster dump a truckload of sand into a large, shallow, and not-quite-square frame he’d hastily constructed out of some old boards and a handful of nails. David, standing nearby, picked up a ball of string and wound it around a handful of nails poking crookedly out of the top edges of the boards, dividing the vast sandbox into a two-by-five grid.

“Okay, kids,” Gwen said, already tired. “Everybody pick a square.”

“And take a rake!” David reminded them. “We’re doing Zen gardens today!” Gwen mostly tuned out his explanation as she watched the campers take their spots. Japanese rock gardens were artistic representations of nature used to aid in meditation… give a lot of thought to how you want yours to look, what you want it to represent… get creative and incorporate other natural materials: rocks, water, plants… As always, he was overly enthusiastic and she couldn’t understand it. Like she’d done every day she’d ever worked with him, she wondered where he got all that energy and positivity _from_. His well was bottomless. She dragged a hand over her face. What she wouldn’t give for just a fraction of that to get her through the day. What was it like to be David? Did it feel as good as it looked, or was he one bad day from snapping like a taut string? As vindicating as it would be to know he was as stressed as she was, she kind of hoped he wasn’t.

Pausing to speak with QM for a moment, Gwen made her way around the sandbox to stand next to David. “If you’re going out of sight of the field for materials, let us know and one of us will come along to supervise,” she instructed, her tone far more monotonous than David’s. “And try not to be too much of a pain in David’s ass. As you can see, the man is burnt to a goddamn crisp.”

For a while they watched as the kids chatted and began to plan out their ideas. Gwen kept her attention mostly on the left side of the sandbox, where Nikki, Max, and Neil had taken squares. She didn’t trust them one bit, especially with the look on Max’s face right now. After a few minutes, Quartermaster came back with the folding chair she’d requested, faded from god knows how many years out in the sun. “Here,” she said, unfolding it behind David. “You should sit down and try not to move so much.”

“Oh, Gwen, how thoughtful!” he gushed. He sat down and propped the umbrella in the gap between the arm and back of the chair, managing to get it to stay over him without his hands on it. “Thank you!”

“Yeah, yeah,” she muttered. “Stay put and keep an eye on these guys. Space Kid wants me to go back to his tent with him to get his space rocks.”

Ten minutes later, Gwen came back and noticed how David was leaning forward – very carefully – with his elbows on his knees. She glanced at the rough fabric strips the seat was woven out of and realized they probably chafed against his back. God, what was with this instinct she’d developed to look after him? He was a grown man, even if he acted like a thirteen-year-old girl half the time. And yet, the way he smiled and made a point not to show his discomfort, she felt like he deserved to have someone looking out for him.

“Anyone else need to go back to the tents?” she asked, shooing Space Kid back to his square of sand. Dolph, Ered, and Preston all jumped up, and she nodded. “Okay, come on.”

While they dug around in their tents for whatever they needed, Gwen slipped back to the counselors’ cabin for a moment, tossing things around the bedroom as she looked for what she was after. In the bottom of her laundry pile she found her best beach towel, a soft blue thing that she normally hogged greedily, and took a moment to soak it in the sink. Ringing it out and tossing it around her shoulders, she grabbed the aloe vera gel and headed back out.

This time, on her return, she waved David out of the chair for a moment. “Here,” she said quietly, draping the towel over the back and seat of the chair. “It’s cool and damp and should be a lot more comfortable to sit on. Also, it’s probably time for us to redo this.” She waved the bottle.

David’s eyes shone. “Thank you, Gwen!” he said. “What can I do to repay you?”

“Take over laundry duty on Saturday,” she told him immediately. Then she started rubbing aloe into his back again.

She felt eyes on her, and glanced nervously over towards the kids. As she’d feared, Max was watching her with his classic evil grin. This was exactly why she’d hesitated to bring the aloe out in the first place, but it was better to use it than just let David _suffer_.

“Hey David,” Max taunted. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but it looks like Gwen is going all _soft_ for you.”

“I am _not_ going _soft_ ,” she snapped back. “You know what a fucking sad sack David is. If someone doesn’t take care of him he’ll be useless, and then what happens to you guys, huh? Because only one of us gives a shit about you, and it’s not me.” That might have been overdoing it, she realized quickly. Max was looking at her with that horrible knowing expression – yeah, she had definitely defended herself a little too aggressively. But god, she was tired of that kid’s accusations.

“Now there’s nothing wrong with softness, Max,” David was admonishing tolerantly, as if she hadn’t said a word. “Showing kindness to the people we care about is how we develop closer bonds and ultimately, how we survive as a species. No man is an island! That goes for Gwen, and for you, too.”

“Yeah, sure,” Max agreed, rolling his eyes. “I’m sure it has nothing to do with you two getting _cozy_.”

Gwen growled, and David just barely managed to throw his hand up in time to prevent her from hurling the aloe vera straight at Max’s head. “Okay! Okay!” he said quickly. “No need for that!”

“Here,” she said shortly, holding the bottle out to him. “Your back is done. You can handle the rest.” Hackles raised, she stomped away, rounding the entire sandbox to stand grumpily on the other side. He watched her go, a look of concern on his face, and when she noticed him he shot her an encouraging smile. Embarrassed, she looked away.

She spent the next couple of hours shuffling the campers around various parts of the camp to fetch materials, stopping sand fights, shouting at Max for trying to dig his way out of the camp, and otherwise standing across from David trying hard not to look at him. It was one thing to be nice to him, but it was another thing entirely for Max to make the kinds of implications he had made. The nerve of that kid! As if _she_ would—

“Hey, Gwen? If you’re not too busy staring at David, I need more rocks.”

Gwen nearly jumped right out of her skin. “ _Jesus_ , Nikki!” she squawked. Then, catching up with what the girl had said, “I was _not_ staring—”

“You totally were,” Nikki told her. “That’s okay, though. My cousin Cassandra told me that staring at shirtless men is a biological impulse you can’t control and that I’d understand it when I got older—”

“ _Okay!_ ” Gwen said loudly. “Let’s go get you those rocks!”

As Nikki trotted down to the lake’s edge to scoop fist-sized stones out of the water, Gwen glanced back over at the campers in the sandbox, and at a fidgety David trying very hard to stay seated while offering Harrison advice.

She had _not_ been staring.

There was nothing to stare at.

 

It had been a long afternoon by the time the kids’ Zen gardens were done, and as expected, they weren’t especially Zen. Gwen glanced over the ones nearest her: Nerris had designed hers like side six of a die, with rocks surrounded by radial lines; Nikki’s was a haphazard pile of rocks, sticks, and mud; Neil’s was, Gwen was fairly certain, a diagram of a molecule; and Max, after being ordered to fill in his attempted escape tunnel, had turned his rake upside down and used the end of the handle to trace a big middle finger. She sighed heavily, not even wanting to see what the other kids had done. “Okay, guys,” she said, sounding tired. “Inside for supper. Let’s go.”

Quartermaster had already been cooking, so Gwen simply helped serve the kids before scooping up supper for herself and David and going to sit down. “Here,” she said gruffly, handing him a tall glass of water. “I know you had a water bottle outside, but you need to stay hydrated.”

“Thank you!” he said cheerfully. Then, “Can I repay all your kindness with an episode or two of X Files tonight?”

“Shit, I forgot I was going to question you about that,” she said. “What’s that about, anyway? I always assumed you watched nothing but Bob Ross and nature documentaries.”

He grinned, clearly amused to have surprised her. “I had a major cryptids-and-ghosts-and-paranormal-stuff phase in my mid-teens,” he explained. “It was an obvious go-to. I ripped all my DVDs to my laptop a few years ago, so if you want, I could treat you to your favourite episode?”

“Fuck yes,” Gwen agreed. Narrowing her eyes, she added, “That doesn’t get you out of taking over laundry duty for me this weekend, though.”

“Of course not!”

“Good.” She took another bite of her cheap boiled hot dog. “This might be unwise, but I wanna watch that first season episode with the creepy forest and the missing loggers.”

 

The next few days passed slowly for Gwen. She spent half of her waking hours trying to run activities, and the other half trying keep David seated, hydrated, and coated in a generous layer of aloe vera, all without drawing too much attention from the campers – especially Max. She certainly didn’t need his stupid commentary. She was just looking after her coworker because without him the camp would definitely fall apart and she would definitely get fired – that was all.

She also definitely wasn’t staring – in fact, she made an effort not even to look at David more than absolutely necessary – because there was nothing to see. David was stronger than he looked, she knew, but he was still a skinny bastard, all lanky and bendy, with shoulders and a back she’d been rubbing aloe into all week and knew entirely too well, though she was less familiar with the front. But neither was particularly interesting. He was just smooth and streamlined, wiry and agile but not very muscled. Not much definition. And, notably, _beet fucking red_ , right now.

It was hard to escape Max’s insinuations altogether. He was, in some ways, entirely too observant, and he clearly _delighted_ in making her squirm. “You sure do love to touch him, Gwen,” he taunted when he spotted her rubbing aloe into David’s back again. “You used to beat him up all the time, but here you are looking after him,” he commented as she refilled David’s water bottle again. “Bet you love seeing his face all red like that, huh?”

“Sometimes I don’t think you quite understand what you’re trying to say,” she shot back, bristling, but trying to keep her voice level. She shouldn’t even be mad at that one, probably. What did he think he was implying? The worst thing about a ten-year-old know-it-all is that he has no idea when he isn’t making sense.

He ignored her. “It’s classic, really. Tough girl spends every summer with this sunshine boy, pretending to be heartless, and eventually she falls in love…”

“Are we talking about Gwen and David?” Nikki asked, bounding over. “If this is about all the staring, she really can’t help it.”

“It’s not just the staring, Nikki,” he told her, his grin wicked. “It’s the touching, the fussing, the _being nice_ , the actually working at things…”

“If you’re still here when I finish cutting up this watermelon,” Gwen threatened through gritted teeth, “I’m punting both of you little shitheads into the lake.”

The worst was when he said things within earshot of David, because the _last_ thing she wanted was for him to believe that Max was _onto_ something. However, David’s powers of selective hearing when it came to Max were more competent than she had realized – somehow he’d learned to filter out a lot of Max’s bullshit, often hearing only the most important parts. Gwen was in the midst of chopping firewood – another job that was usually David’s – when Max made a particularly inappropriate comment about her getting her hands on David’s wood, and she nearly dropped the axe she was holding. She glanced at David, sitting a few feet away assembling firestarters out of cut-up egg cartons and dryer lint, but he seemed blissfully unaware of Max’s innuendo. How did he do that?

Leaning down so she was nearly nose-to-nose with the smug camper, she hissed, “Listen, fucko. If David didn’t like you so much, I’d happily use this axe on your horrible little _head_.”

Max only grinned again. “Gee, Gwen, when did you start caring so much about David’s feelings?”

“Mother _fucker_ ,” she growled in frustration, a little too loudly, and that finally seemed to get David’s attention.

“What’s the matter, Gwen?” he asked, standing up quickly. “Are you hurt?”

“No, but Max is _gonna_ be if he doesn’t leave me the _fuck_ alone,” she warned, kicking at a chunk of log near her feet.

“Come on, Max,” David said, his tone admonishing. “Don’t bother Gwen while she’s got work to do!”

“Fine, fine.” Making a comment under his breath about a ‘coworker to do,’ Max turned around and walked away, and Gwen barely managed to keep herself from throwing a piece of firewood at him.

“You can’t let him get under your skin, Gwen,” David said, stepping closer and placing a hand on her shoulder. “He’s just acting out, you know.”

“He’s tenacious as shit once he finds something that gets to you, though,” she complained, sighing.

“What’s he latched onto that’s bothering you so much?” he asked.

She turned to look into his still-red face, this face she’d looked at so much in the last few days, this face that she’d spent her last several summers looking at. He looked so concerned, so ready to listen. “It’s… it’s nothing,” she said softly.

 

By Thursday evening, David emerged from the bathroom after another cool shower and said, “Good news! My blisters are starting to heal up. I think I should be fine to dress as normal by tomorrow morning.”

“Thank god,” Gwen answered, not looking up from his laptop as she sifted through X Files episode titles, trying to remember what was what. She wasn’t going to mention it to David, but she was tired of Max and Nikki accusing her of staring. They were pretty insistent. At least once he put a shirt back on, they’d have no grounds any more. “Hey, do you have a favourite episode? We’ve watched all mine, but now you’ve got me in the X Files mood…”

“I wish I had thought to ask you to watch it with me ages ago,” he commented. “This is the best idea I’ve had in a while.”

“What?” She glanced up in surprise, and saw him smiling so warmly at her that her stomach wobbled. Now what was _that_ all about?

“It’s just really fun to share this with you,” he told her. “I like watching the show with you and getting your read on things. It’s so interesting how you interpret the show in ways I never would have thought of. And I like having something to bond with you over. It feels like we’ve been getting along really well lately!”

Gwen looked back down at the screen, embarrassed for some reason. “Do you know how many literature classes I’ve taken?” she pointed out, deflecting. “I can analyse the _shit_ out of anything you put in front of me.”

 

Gwen knew she was officially in big, big trouble when, the next morning, her split-second, knee-jerk reaction to David walking fully clothed around their cabin was something akin to disappointment. She quickly buried it under all her usual early-morning crankiness and shitty attitude, going quietly about her routine and avoiding eye contact.

Today was edible plants camp, which she assumed was a good way to guarantee that at least one camper died, but luckily David had roped Quartermaster into helping. He scared the kids enough that they listened _just_ a little bit better than usual, except for Nikki. She ate everything she could find, seemingly suffering no ill effects, and Gwen tried hard not to panic. “Don’t worry, Gwen. Nikki’s unkillable,” Harrison commented casually at one point, and she decided not to ask how he knew that.

It was late afternoon when QM and David started to lead them back to camp, Gwen lagging at the back of the group to watch for stragglers. Letting QM pull ahead with an excited Nikki at his heels, still asking him to identify every single tree and bush, David lollygagged until he could fall into step with Gwen at the back.

“Hey,” he said softly, nudging her with an elbow. He reached into his backpack and pulled out one of the little plastic baggies the kids had used to collect their findings. It was full of raspberries.

“I never saw those,” she answered, matching his low volume. “You didn’t point them out to the kids?”

He shook his head. “There was only the one bush, so what I’ve got here is pretty much all there was to harvest,” he said. “And I remembered how much you like raspberries, so I figured I’d just save them for you.” He held the bag up until she caught his meaning and opened a hand to take it.

She stared at the bag for a second, and then she stared up at David’s peeling red face, his bright smile. “I… thanks,” she answered, finding herself suddenly faced with emotions she didn’t want to try to identify. What was it with him and his memory for details, his sweet gestures, his infinite kindness? How did a person become like that? And how could a person like that seem to think so highly of her?

“You’re welcome!” he said, and for an instant she was dazzled.

In an attempt to cut off her current line of thought, she opened the bag and picked one of the berries out. Then she held it out towards him in a silent offer. It only seemed polite.

“Thank you!” he said cheerfully, and they each popped a berry in their mouths. They were small, but in terms of flavour, they were perfect. For a moment or two they both just appreciated that, and then David glanced up at the front of the group again. “I’m gonna go save Quartermaster,” he told her, and she glanced up and saw Nikki riding along on the poor old man’s leg. Gwen nodded, and David jogged ahead. She watched him go.

 

Eventually, finally, it was evening, the campers were going to bed, and Gwen could breathe a little. Saturday was the day they let the kids sleep in and didn’t schedule any particular activities, which meant that Friday nights were her favourite part of the entire week.

She had been reading in her chair in the little front room of their cabin, enjoying the quiet, and the chance to focus on something completely unrelated to anyone she knew in real life. No annoying ten-year-olds making rude implications. No bright-eyed redheads to pointedly avoid thinking about. After an hour or so, though, she finished her book. She didn’t want to move, but the alternative was to sit there alone with her thoughts, and that wouldn’t do.

She hauled herself out of the chair and headed into the bedroom to find something else to read, and there she found David, sitting shirtless on his bed with a bottle of aloe vera gel, struggling to reach his back.

She sighed. “You could have asked for help, you know,” she told him.

He looked up. “You didn’t seem like you were in a great mood today,” he answered. “So I just… figured I wouldn’t bother you.”

“Here.” Gwen stepped closer and picked up the bottle, moving to sit behind him on the mattress. “Just let me do it.” There was no thinking to it now, as she rubbed the gel into his skin. Across his shoulders, down his back. It had become so familiar over the course of the week. Without really realizing, she was going a little slower than she usually did.

David let out a little sigh of relief, slouching forward as her hands moved in circles down his spine. “Thanks,” he murmured. She was quiet, and after a second, he added, “You’ve been really nice to me this week. It hasn’t gone unnoticed, you know.”

“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” she answered, but there was no conviction to her tone. She knew it was a weak defense even before she said it.

“Sure you do,” he insisted. “You’ve done a lot to help me out this week, even after the kids teased you once or twice.” She rolled her eyes. He really _was_ oblivious. “And not just the obvious stuff like what you’re doing now. Making sure I’m drinking water and protected from the sun, trying to take over more of my work and pick activities that mean I don’t have to move around a lot… You’ve been very sweet. I know you don’t like all the ‘touchy-feely’ stuff, so I tried to thank you with things like the raspberries, and all that X Files we’ve been watching, but I wanted to say something, too. I’ve noticed everything you’ve done, and I appreciate it very much.”

Her fingers slowed as she spread the last bit of the gel into the small of his back, and she slumped a little. Sighing – there was a lot of that lately – she said softly, “You’re welcome.” Her hands came to a stop behind his hips, fingertips just ghosting against his skin, and she didn’t really register. There was too much on her mind for her to notice her body.

“Are you all right?” David asked quietly.

Harried and tired after the week she’d had, she ran a hand back through her hair, yanking out her ponytail as she went. “I’m… exhausted,” she answered finally, fingers going back down to idle against his back. “Those kids are a lot. And they do really like to make our lives as difficult and unpleasant as possible, don’t they?”

“Sometimes,” he admitted, to her surprise. “But that’s just… what kids are like, a lot of the time. But when you really make a connection with them, really teach them something, it’s that much more rewarding.” He didn’t turn around to face her, just kept staring down into his lap. “Did it bother you when they bugged you about being nice to me?”

He could be so oblivious, so doggedly optimistic, that she often forgot he was also capable of being quite perceptive, when he calmed down. “Yeah,” she said. “I’m… not a completely mean person, David. But with those little monsters it’s so much easier, more practical, to be a hardass than to show them a softer side. You know… give them an inch, and all that. They’re ruthless. But it means that I’m also _trapped_ in that mean persona. They see anything else and they’ll pick at it forever.”

“I know you’re not mean,” he told her. “And I think it’s… I think you’re very strong, letting the campers see your not-mean side. Not everyone _can_ break away from their reputation that way.”

Gwen sighed yet again, leaning further forward until her forehead fell against his bare back, padded by her thick bangs. “I just feel tired,” she said. “I just feel really, really tired.”

“Can I do anything?” he asked. “Do you… want a day off, or something? You could stay here and rest tomorrow, if you want. I know it’s not a lot, but…”

She shook her head just slightly, rubbing her hair against his back in doing so. “No, it’s not just that. I mean… a break would be good, but not that kind of break. More a break from being Camp Counselor Gwen, a chance to just be regular Gwen.”

“What would regular Gwen like to do?” David asked.

She let that question sit for a moment. She knew the answer by now, there was no real sense in denying it, but like hell she was going to tell him. “I don’t know,” she finally whispered.

Finally, she became aware of where her hands were – where her whole _body_ was, really, when had she gotten so close? – when he reached back and closed his fingers around her own. Hesitantly, he held them for a moment, then pulled her hands forward around his waist, drawing her close in something approximating a hug. Taken by surprise, she let him hold her that way for a few seconds, his arms over hers around his stomach. Even though she was bent forward at an awkward angle, there was something profoundly _pleasant_ about the contact, something close and comfortable that made her stomach warm.

The right side of her face was pressed against the flat of his shoulder blade, and she felt her cheek stick slightly to the drying aloe as she reluctantly peeled away from him. “David…” she said quietly. She wanted to stay where she was, but it was too intimate, too cozy, too _nice_. It wasn’t sustainable.

“I’m sorry,” he said quickly, letting go of her arms. “I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable. I – I forget sometimes–”

“It’s okay, David,” she told him with a sigh, pulling away slowly. “It was just an awkward position for me.”

“I’m _so_ sorry,” he continued to babble. “Of course that makes sense–”

“I meant physically, David,” she interrupted again. “I was leaning forward too far.”

“Oh,” he answered, shutting up. She smiled just a little, having no trouble picturing the look of embarrassment on his face, even though he still hadn’t turned around.

Her eyes traced up his back, and before she could stop herself she was struck again by a powerful desire to kiss his shoulder. It was the same impulse that had caused her to pull away a moment before, and she blinked it away as quickly as she could.

“I just want to help you,” David blurted, and she could tell by the tone of his voice how awkward he was feeling. “I care about you very much, Gwen, and I want to be able to help you feel better. Sometimes I don’t know what to offer, because sometimes you’re hard to read, and all I know to give when there’s nothing else is a hug.”

“You’re really sweet, David.” She shifted backwards slightly, wondering how she could end this conversation and leave his bed, because she was feeling heavier and heavier and this was growing more and more difficult.

“I… Gwen, hang on.” Planting his hands against the mattress, David finally turned around to face her, crossing his legs Indian-style so he could sit close. “I’m just… if there’s anything I can do for you, I want to. Because you get me through a lot here, even if you don’t realize it. And it’s okay if you don’t want to tell me, but I just wanted to try one more time… because earlier when I asked what you wanted to do, you said you didn’t know, but it sounded a little like you did and just didn’t want to say it.”

Gwen stared at him, again, because between all that and the look on his face she felt a little winded. His smile was so sincere and so caring, yet so _worried_ , like it really did pain him that he had no idea how to help her. She couldn’t think of the last time she’d been looked at like that, if ever. How did he wear his heart on his sleeve that way? How could his face be so expressive? And how come it made her feel like she could barely breathe?

It was so easy to convince herself that he only cared so much about her because he cared so much about everyone. It was so _easy_ to believe that she was no more than a work friend to him at best. Or at least, it usually was. But being looked at like that, she couldn’t make herself accept the idea that she meant so little to him. That familiar anxious, distrusting voice in the back of her mind screamed and screamed that David was _always_ this much, this extreme, but the rest of her didn’t listen. How could a man looking at her like that think of her as a mere coworker?

Normally, when she ignored the mental air raid sirens that told her something was a bad idea, the stakes were lower than this.

 _I want you_ , she thought, or probably thought, because the slightest breath might have passed her lips, which might have been moving, but really she couldn’t tell.

“Gwen?” David asked, watching her face with concern, his eyes wide. She couldn’t decide if his burnt face looked a fraction redder than it had a moment ago or if that meant anything. She wasn’t thinking any more.

She was leaning forward, she was reaching out to take his face between her hands and yank him in, she was kissing him.

 _You’re making the biggest fucking mistake of your mistake-riddled life,_ shrieked the anxious voice, but it shrivelled up and died when she felt David’s hand on her neck, not pushing her away but holding her in place.

Gwen was anxious again the moment they parted and her brain kicked back into gear. She let go of him quickly and fell awkwardly backwards, looking down to the floor.  “David, I– I’m sorry–”

“Wait, Gwen–”

“God, you must think I’m such a fucking _horndog_ – I swear I didn’t–”

“Gwen, please, I don’t–”

“I just–” and here she gulped down an enormous breath and screwed her eyes shut. “I just– I spend every goddamn summer trapped in this tiny cabin with you and I’ve gotten to know you so well, so much better than I ever thought I _wanted_ to, and you’re just so fucking _nice,_ all the way down, like– like you’re the nicest person I’ve ever met, and it’s hard not to really get fond of that, and then the way you were _looking_ at me just now, _Christ_ –”

“ _Gwen!_ ” David said loudly, finally breaking through her babble. “Gwen, I didn’t mind. You don’t have anything to apologize for.”

“I’m sorry, David,” she said again, despite what he’d just told her. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me lately. This is– this is so fucking unprofessional. I know we’re just coworkers. I’m not– I wasn’t trying to like, jump your bones, I swear, I just– fuck, is it worse to bang your coworker or fall for them? Fuckfuckfuck–”

“ _Gwen,_ ” he repeated, this time reaching towards her as she tried to stumblingly leave the bed. He captured her hands between his and kept her in place, and finally she opened her eyes a little and dared to look over at him. She still couldn’t be sure, through the sunburn, how much he was blushing, but he looked embarrassed. Shit, what had she _done?_ “I– it’s– I like you too,” he stammered. “Like, a lot. A… a lot a lot.”

“What?” she asked, disbelieving.

“I do!” he repeated, nodding hurriedly as if that would reassure her. “I have for– for a couple years, at least. I mean, I only see you in the summer, really. But, I don’t know, I started to notice it the year before last. Then last year when we got here again it had gotten a lot… bigger, over the course of the year, even though we only talked a couple of times. This year it was… it’s been almost unmanageable.”

“You… what?” Gwen blinked, trying to process all of that. She had stopped trying to pull away from him, now just sitting across from him, leaning back, letting him hold her hands. One of his thumbs ran nervously along the outside of her own.

He nodded again, smile growing, though he still looked nervous as well. “Really,” he said. “I… I don’t know how you feel about it, but I might even say I love you? Not in a way that has to be a big deal, I never thought that had to be a big deal, I think the world needs a lot more love and I like to tell people I love them when I can, although if that makes you uncomfortable I don’t have to bring it up again, I just care about you so much and I don’t think love is that complicated and I would definitely describe how I feel about you as love–”

She launched herself forward, throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him again. He was a little startled, and almost knocked backwards, but he found his balance and wrapped his arms around her back as she scooted forward on her knees, straddling his lap without putting too much weight on him.

Of _course_ David would say he loved her.

Two whole goddamn years. At _least_ , he’d said. Christ. She had denied letting herself admit her feelings for a while now, so she wasn’t sure when exactly they became what they were. It was more like her affection had grown, very slowly and organically, as she’d spent so much time with him. Every Christmas gift and birthday card he had mailed her, every holiday he’d sent her a long text and they’d spent an hour catching up on each other’s major news, every article he’d emailed her with ideas for new camp activities, she had grown just a little bit fonder. And at some point, she’d fallen, despite the fact that he wasn’t her type at all and it made no fucking sense.

Gwen was very, very practiced at denial, but everyone had a breaking point. Apparently hers had been in the neighbourhood of second-degree sunburns.

“David,” she said, leaning her forehead against his and taking a deep breath.

“Mm?” he answered quietly, almost panting.

“I’ve never been… a person who throws the word love around very much,” she told him slowly. “But if you just mean it as like, a lot of affection… and not in a way that’s a big important deal or a giant commitment or anything… then I might, y’know, love you. A bit. I don’t know. I like you very much, and I really want to keep doing this.” She opened her eyes a little, gauging his reaction.

David was smiling ear to ear, still maybe-probably blushing under his burns. “I’ll take it,” he breathed, opening his own eyes to meet her gaze. “I like you very much too, Gwen.”

She bit down on an unreasonably large smile of her own. “So, verdict on continuing this?” she asked, still seeking further confirmation.

“Yes, please,” he sighed blissfully.

“Okay.” Gwen closed the gap again, her stomach flipping.

It had been quite a week.


End file.
